I can remember one of my first trips to Portugal. I was warned a few times by regular british drivers to portugal to be very aware when going down a mountain at "Villar Formosa". I thought to myself.."Ive been down mountains before..I know what to expect".

2 days later I was coming over the Spaniash/Portuguese border throught the town of Villar Formosa...I was told the mountain or at least the descent was just after the town. I carried on and just after the town I started to go down a descent at night in fog. I backed off, geared down and let the retarder take me down. After a few minutes 2 Portuguese trucks came flying past me. I thought.."Oh well they know this road ..I don't". Anyway, I couldn't help feeling this this particular hill was nothing special...infact I thought it was abit "tame' compared to such mountains as Sumo Sierre and Pamplona (the old road) in Spain.

About 4 or 5 miles outside of the town the road levelled off and I carried on..forgetting about "Villar Formosa". I passed the 2 portuguese trucks that had just flown by me as I was coming down the mountain...they had parked for the night it seemed. Then a few miles further, I rounded a medium to sharp bend and couldn't believe what I was looking at directly infront of my out the windsheild at eye level..........nothing. The road just suddenly fell away and it was then I realised...THIS is the Villar Formosa they were talking about and I was at the top of it doing 60mph..at night...in fog. What I had thought was Villar Formosoa was just a ******* hill. I braked hard and sharp and flicked the retarder to the 5th position (Scanias have a 5 position retarder and they are awesome) I caught it well enough in time to go down the mountain at a safe speed without touching the brakes.

I was told a day or so later by a Portuguese trucker that there was a big court case going on about the "new road" down Villar Formosa. Aparently the government had accepted tenders from a number of Portuguese cicvil engineering companies to build a new road down the mountain and had accepted a bid from one. That company had submitted plans with bridges and tunnels for a slow descent down the mountain for big rigs etc as the old road was not much more than a donkey and cart track. Instead of the civil engineering company building tunnels and bridges they basically stoood at the top of the mountain and poured a couple of 1000's truckloads of black top down the mountain and said ..."There's your road". (OK slight exaggeration but you get the point. After the road had been opened for 4 days 6 tractor trailers had burnt out their brakes and gone off at a turn, killing the drivers. To this day there are a few burnt out trucks you can still see as they cant get the equipment there to remove them.

Last I heard the CEO of the civil engineering company was seeing out the rest of his life in a Portuguese jail.

Then again...all of this could just be some of the typical BS you hear that is an occupational hazard when you drive a truck for a living.

Got a funny story about this one, now that you mention it!

They have one of those pull-off deals on US 322 up in PA, either going into or coming out of Lewistown, around the Seven Mountains nature trail at the top of a big hill. (It's been years since I ran up there, and I'm a little spotty on what's where.)

I was running this route every week, and I knew about the pulloff. I saw the DOT was in there this time, working hard. Oh goody. I always stopped at the pulloff anyway, but this time it was really clogged up with trucks to where I could barely get in there. I had to pull around this one truck, then weave in between two more, and a DOT cop or three until I finally threaded my way through that mess to get to the stop sign and the sign about where the suicide ramps are.

Except there was no stop sign. No sign about the suicide ramps. I was on the wrong hill, a couple miles before the big one. This wasn't the pulloff, but a DOT random roadside thing, that I just went to extraordinary lengths to waltz right into the middle of, making a HUGE spectacle of myself in the process!!

:lol: :shock: :lol: :shock: :lol: :shock:

To top it all off, I had something wrong with the trailer. I think it was a wheel seal cap that wouldn't quit dribbling, and was making a big mess, but not taking an excessive amount of oil to stay topped up, which I was nursing home at the boss's behest. Something like that. Messy, smelly, big red flag, and I just drove it way out of my way into the middle of a DOT check that I didn't even have to stop for, because they had already pulled in all the trucks they were looking to flag over with that.

He checked my logbook, my triangles and fire extinguisher, and my trailer lights, but he never walked around to the side of the trailer that was oozing grease. Told me to get the hell out of there, and be sure to stop at the stop thing a couple miles down the road, and have a nice day.

WHEW!!!

Silvan: that was too funny! You KNEW about the turnout? But, missed where it was? Stop daydreaming, and pay attention to where you are! :lol:

You only GET one lucky break per year! That was yours!! :lol: :lol:

Um.... What??? Brake pads, made out of asbestos, WILL burn if overheated. Asbestos is chemically engineered to be fire "retardant." But, it is not foolproof. And, yes, metal will burn. So, your point is that no one burns breaks unless they break a seal? :shock:

Besides.... we're not talking about "burning' brakes. We're talking about smoking them. The difference is, that when you "smoke your brakes," you create a LACK of friction, replaced by fire and an asbestos JELLO that negates the purpose of a "friction" brake. Then they FADE. Then you go down the hill "out of control" whether on fire or not! And you usually die! :lol:

I've seen a few trucks at the bottom of the hill on fire. Who could tell whether it was metal burning or asbestos jello burning (or an oil seal?) The flame engulfed the reefer unit, and conseqently, the load was "lost."

Moral of the story.... don't abuse your brakes!!

That's the problem running the same route over and over and over. You kind of stop seeing things for what they are sometimes. I was expecting a stop at the top of a hill along about here, and this was a stop at the top of a hill along about here. It escaped me that the scenery wasn't quite right.
That was a long time ago. I can't remember the last time I ran that route.

I do remember my lucky break last year, I think it was. I managed to get out of a ticket by commiserating with a DOT cop about how much I hate fricking computers. I'll have to tell that one sometime.